Biggest winner: (noticeably increased number of) documentaries.
Biggest laughs:
Udo Kier’s look (you’ll know which one when you see it) in Gus van Sant’s Don't Worry, He Won't Get Far on Foot.
Best #TimesUp moment (tie):
Friday, February 23. 2018
#Berlinale2018: Top Take-aways
Biggest winner: (noticeably increased number of) documentaries.
Biggest laughs:
Udo Kier’s look (you’ll know which one when you see it) in Gus van Sant’s Don't Worry, He Won't Get Far on Foot.
Best #TimesUp moment (tie):
+ Friend reacting to protagonist’s lesbian joke in Don't Worry He Won't Get Far On Foot:
What’s worse than a group of women who don’t need men?
+ Steven Soderbergh's smart phone-shot Unsane, in its entirety
Best festival opening film:
Wes Anderson’s Isle of Dogs - honouring Wes Anderson‘s history with the Berlinale (Grand Budapest Hotel opened the festival four years ago) + great reviews + hommage to Japanese anime + ...
Most interesting films:
An Elephant Sitting Still (China). Insane (USA). My Brother Robert (Germany)
Boldest director's statement:
Venice and Cannes are tourist attractions. Here in Berlin, it’s freezing in February and Potsdamer Platz sucks. So we have to be a lab!
Christian Petzold, when asked why he signed a (protest) letter about the future of the Berlinale, channeling some “poor but sexy” Berlin love
Most Zen director's statement:
This will likely not be a summer hit. But then a film is not a hostage-taking, you can always leave.
Philip Groening on his hardcore 3-hour competition film My Brother Robert
Funniest exchange at presser:
Journo to director Groening:
How did you cast the cricket?
(Director embarks on a lengthy report of hiring local farmers' kids as scouts...)
Best intercultural exchange at presser:
Brazilian journalist to Rosamund Pike about José Padilha’s (mediocre political thriller) 7 Days in Entebbe:
Did you feel a certain “Brazility”, working with a Brazilian crew?
Pike:
We made a lot of plans and they went right out of the window. I’m not sure that’s Brazilian….
Journo:
Oh yeah it is.
Best non-sex sex scene:
Police officer & receptionist in Unsane
Best (and friendliest) street food truck:
Uruguayan empanadas
My biggest TIFF déformation professionnelle:
When you suddenly feel the urge to be the one lone pirate arrrr at Berlinale pre-show piracy deterrence but know it will be (extra) embarrassing because none of the other 2000 visitors will know the Toronto tradition before public screenings.
Biggest (if not latest) trend:
“based on real events” (Entebbe; Quiberon; Transit; The Silent Revolution; ...)
Most prominent themes:
+ “Timeless” films (Transit; La Priere)
+ Global Western (Damsel; Black47)
+ Films about addiction and/or withdrawal (La Priere; Don’t Worry; 3 Days in Quiberon; Boys Cry)
+ Plot “guy passes off dead writer’s script as his own” (Transit; Eva)
+ Numbered competition titles (3 Days in Quiberon; 7 Days in Entebbe; Black 47; U - July 22)
+ Actors in more than one film: Alex Brendemühl, Udo Kier, Paula Beer, Birgit Minichmayr (3 Days in Quiberon; Only God Can Judge Me)
Best new initiative:
Couldn´t make it to Berlin? Watch eight festival highlights on the screening platform Festival Scope (plus Telefilm Canada’s curated selection of Canadian films on German iTunes)
Most awe-inspiring moment:
Next to Daniel Brühl at the Entebbe press conference is Jacques Lemoine, the actual engineer on the hijacked AF 139, who refused to leave the Israeli hostages in Uganda in 1976. pic.twitter.com/UaG2HkOlFT
Best non-native on-screen German:
Fluent & flawless Rosamund Pike as 1970s left-wing terrorist Brigitte Kuhlmann.
Happiest overall Berlin moment:
Balkan buskers on the subway deliver the hottest version of Despacito that has people jump up and dance.
Film I wish I hadn’t missed:
Las Herederas (Paraguay-Germany)
See you next February, Berlin!
by @JuttaBrendemuhl
What’s worse than a group of women who don’t need men?
+ Steven Soderbergh's smart phone-shot Unsane, in its entirety
Best festival opening film:
Wes Anderson’s Isle of Dogs - honouring Wes Anderson‘s history with the Berlinale (Grand Budapest Hotel opened the festival four years ago) + great reviews + hommage to Japanese anime + ...
Most interesting films:
An Elephant Sitting Still (China). Insane (USA). My Brother Robert (Germany)
Boldest director's statement:
Venice and Cannes are tourist attractions. Here in Berlin, it’s freezing in February and Potsdamer Platz sucks. So we have to be a lab!
Christian Petzold, when asked why he signed a (protest) letter about the future of the Berlinale, channeling some “poor but sexy” Berlin love
Most Zen director's statement:
This will likely not be a summer hit. But then a film is not a hostage-taking, you can always leave.
Philip Groening on his hardcore 3-hour competition film My Brother Robert
Funniest exchange at presser:
Journo to director Groening:
How did you cast the cricket?
(Director embarks on a lengthy report of hiring local farmers' kids as scouts...)
Best intercultural exchange at presser:
Brazilian journalist to Rosamund Pike about José Padilha’s (mediocre political thriller) 7 Days in Entebbe:
Did you feel a certain “Brazility”, working with a Brazilian crew?
Pike:
We made a lot of plans and they went right out of the window. I’m not sure that’s Brazilian….
Journo:
Oh yeah it is.
Best non-sex sex scene:
Police officer & receptionist in Unsane
Best (and friendliest) street food truck:
Uruguayan empanadas
My biggest TIFF déformation professionnelle:
When you suddenly feel the urge to be the one lone pirate arrrr at Berlinale pre-show piracy deterrence but know it will be (extra) embarrassing because none of the other 2000 visitors will know the Toronto tradition before public screenings.
Biggest (if not latest) trend:
“based on real events” (Entebbe; Quiberon; Transit; The Silent Revolution; ...)
Most prominent themes:
+ “Timeless” films (Transit; La Priere)
+ Global Western (Damsel; Black47)
+ Films about addiction and/or withdrawal (La Priere; Don’t Worry; 3 Days in Quiberon; Boys Cry)
+ Plot “guy passes off dead writer’s script as his own” (Transit; Eva)
+ Numbered competition titles (3 Days in Quiberon; 7 Days in Entebbe; Black 47; U - July 22)
+ Actors in more than one film: Alex Brendemühl, Udo Kier, Paula Beer, Birgit Minichmayr (3 Days in Quiberon; Only God Can Judge Me)
Best new initiative:
Couldn´t make it to Berlin? Watch eight festival highlights on the screening platform Festival Scope (plus Telefilm Canada’s curated selection of Canadian films on German iTunes)
Most awe-inspiring moment:
Next to Daniel Brühl at the Entebbe press conference is Jacques Lemoine, the actual engineer on the hijacked AF 139, who refused to leave the Israeli hostages in Uganda in 1976. pic.twitter.com/UaG2HkOlFT
Best non-native on-screen German:
Fluent & flawless Rosamund Pike as 1970s left-wing terrorist Brigitte Kuhlmann.
Happiest overall Berlin moment:
Balkan buskers on the subway deliver the hottest version of Despacito that has people jump up and dance.
Film I wish I hadn’t missed:
Las Herederas (Paraguay-Germany)
See you next February, Berlin!
by @JuttaBrendemuhl
Trackbacks
Trackback specific URI for this entry
